Amigos de Músicahttp://www.amigos-de-musica.org
Organisation to support artists in the AlgarveFri, 17 May 2019 11:20:41 +0000en-UShourly1https://wordpress.org/?v=5.0.4June Concertshttp://www.amigos-de-musica.org/2019/05/june-concerts-3/
Fri, 17 May 2019 10:53:05 +0000http://www.amigos-de-musica.org/?p=5152Tuesday, June 11 and Thursday, June, 13

ALISSA FIRSOVA,
PIANO & DANIEL ROWLAND, VIOLIN will give two concerts at Os Agostos during June
2019. The first on Tuesday June 11
will include the world premiere of Alissa’s latest composition “Algarvia” as
well as pieces by Elgar and Walton. The second, on Thursday June 13, will
feature compositions by Prokofiev, Piazzola, Ravel, Milhaud as well as
“Algarvia”. Alissa composed
“Algarvia” during a recent trip to the Algarve.

Amigos de Música concerts at Os Agostos begin at 7.00pm
sharp. Doors open at 6.00pm and wine, fruit juices and canapés will be served.
There will also be a short interval with refreshments served. Entry donation is
€25 per person for guests and non-members.

The AMIGOS DE MÚSICA is an international group of
around 90 members who stage musical activities by internationally renowned
musicians and also sponsor young Portuguese musicians. It is a non-profit
organization and celebrated its twenty-eighth anniversary last year.

Os Agostos is an
impressive XVlll century country estate located above Santa Bárbara de Nexe and
near Bordeira. For navigation instructions go to: http://www.osagostos.com and then to “HOW TO GET THERE”.

It was good to
spend the Easter week with so many of you at Os Agostos. We enjoyed, and were
bowled over, by the music of the amazing Katya
Apekisheva. This young pianist
has a power, imagination and concentration that puts her in the highest
bracket. Her account of the Schubert

Moments
Musicaux was for me the most poetic and intimate, and of the Janacek she gave a
thoughtful and ruminative account to which few failed to respond. A generous surprise was the encore on
Tuesday, when she played with great virtuosity dances by the Argentinian
composer Alberto Ginastera. Great music, wonderful evenings and warm
conviviality. It might interest you to know that the programme Katya chose for
the Thursday recital is the one she will be playing on June 6th at
the Wigmore Hall in London. And I
can already promise a return of this wonderful artist to Os Agostos during the
2020/2021 concert season when she will be playing at four hands with the other
Amigo favourite, Charles Owen.

****

Now to the future:

1. On Tuesday, May
14th and Thursday, May 16th, 2019 we welcome back the
Berlin Duo of Holger Groschopp, piano
and Adele Bitter, cello. They will bring us a programme of music by Czech
composers Janacek and Martinu and by Mendelssohn on Tuesday, and by Beethoven,
Brahms, Duparc and Chopin on Thursday.
See the full programmes online.

When you make
your reservations PLEASE NOTE the following: For the concert on Tuesday, May
14th, 2019 the gates at Os Agostos will open, as usual, at 18:00,
but the catering will be most unusual. This Amigo concert event was chosen by our
main Sponsors, the real estate company Quinta
Properties, aka QP-Savills, as the occasion to bring to our attention the
impending opening of their third office. QP, as you know, has been our most
important financial supporter, without whose generosity our programming and
young musician sponsorship activities would have been seriously constrained.
Their new office, QP Country, will
operate from their own building on the Avenida in Loulé, and QP representatives
will be at hand, before the concert and during the interval, to talk about
their strategy and plans. The catering will be more elaborate and enhanced than
usual, both pre-concert and during a prolonged interval. Don’t miss this very
special occasion – and try not to arrive late!

This special
event is reserved for the Tuesday concert only.

****

2. On Tuesday, May 21st, 2019 we shall be celebrating the 75th Birthday of Paul Crossley.

Helga Hampton with pianist ,Paul Crossley at. Os Agostos

You received
and responded to my invitation and I am very proud that we will have an almost
full Amigo membership as well-wishers at the Party. Thank you for the swift and
enthusiastic response.

Please come to Os Agostos on 21.5. at 19:00 when we shall assemble in the auditorium to hear Paul`s recital before taking him and his partner to a full and festive buffet prepared on the terraces, where we can thank the Maestro in our very best style with bubbly and candled cake.

You will receive the full programme of the recital, and I ask you – please – to let me know a few days in advance if anything has changed in your plans. Only regrets are necessary. I will need a final head count by May 17th – to helga.hampton@btinternet.com

****

3. On Saturday, June 22nd, 2019 will be our Amigo Mid-Summer Night Party !!

We
plan to end the 2018/19 season with a party at Os Agostos, in cool early evening in the garden by
the pool, with a festive 3-course sit-down dinner for Amigos with family and
friends !! Does that sound as good to you as it did to us when we put our
heads together in the planning ?

I am
herewith asking you to give me your provisional availability for this
occasion as final planning necessarily depends on the number of people
attending. (e.g. price per person is quantity-dependent). It might interest you
to know that Os Agostos, whose main “business” is big weddings, now have a
famous new chef in their very active kitchen. How lucky we were to get this
significant date on a Saturday!

Please
let me know if and how many of you plan to join us in our beautiful venue.
THIS IS NOT URGENT, but please send an email to me by end May: helga.hampton@btinternet.com

Of
course you know that there will be music !!! Our sponsoree, Tiago
Rosario, now a piano student at the Music Hoch-Schule in Munster, Germany,
will give us a demonstration of his progress at the beginning of the party, and
I can promise you a good surprise.
This young man is already going places and winning prizes.

****

PLEASE NOTE: Housekeeping Rules –
I am compelled to repeat these more strongly than ever !!!

1.
Reservations are absolutely necessary,
even for all active members ! Everyone, including
Amigos, who come to OA
without a firm reservation will probably not get a seat, as we are usually
fully booked.

2.
Make your email reservations
as soon as you plan to attend certain concerts. However, PLEASE don’t make them
more than one month in advance – we have noticed that
earlier ones tend to get forgotten and then not cancelled.

3.
Cancellations are also
absolutely necessary, as the liberated seats can then be sold to the public.

4. Newest Rule: Please turn your phones off during the concert ! We have had complaints about the bother
of brightly lit screens, and recording a recital needs a licence or else is
punishable. .

You will receive confirmation, but please cancel as soon
as you know you cannot attend.

******

Finally here the reminder for a music festival further afield. The 6th Festival Internacional de Music de Marvao – FIMM – has announced the Programme for this year online. It takes place between 19th and 28th of July 2019 and tickets have been available. Many Amigos who have gone to this quaint town in the Alentejo recommend it very much for its calibre of musicians, its varied programme and, of course, for the beauty of this old town. Make your reservations as soon as possible.

For
any and all questions, or good suggestions you might have, please contact me
anytime via email.

HOLGER GROSCHOPP, PIANO & ADELE BITTER, CELLO are Berliners making a welcome return to the Algarve to play for the Amigos and friends. They will give two recitals at Os Agostos during May 2019. The first recital, on Tuesday May 14, will feature music by Janáček, Mendelssohn-Barholdy and Martinů. The second recital, on Thursday May 16, will have music by Beethoven, Brahms, Busoni, Duparc and Chopin.

Amigos de Música concerts at Os Agostos begin at 7.00pm
sharp. Doors open at 6.00pm and wine, fruit juices and canapés will be served.
There will also be a short interval with refreshments served. Entry donation is
€25 per person for guests and non-members.

The AMIGOS DE MÚSICA is an international group of
around 90 members who stage musical activities by internationally renowned
musicians and also sponsor young Portuguese musicians. It is a non-profit
organization and celebrated its twenty-eighth anniversary last year.

Os Agostos is an
impressive XVlll century country estate located above Santa Bárbara de Nexe and
near Bordeira. For navigation instructions go to: http://www.osagostos.com and then to “HOW TO GET THERE”.

Dear Amigos all,INVITATIONOne of our most eminent and most faithful pianists asked to celebrate his 75th Birthday with the Amigos Paul Crossleywill be coming out of retirement and play for us a beautifully selected programme of his most famous and favourite works of piano music; on Tuesday, May 21st, 2019 – 19:00 at Os AgostosHow privileged are we to have the Maestro give us the chance to celebrate this occasion with and for him?I herewith extend my invitation to you to come to Os Agostos for this festive occasion. We shall hear the concert first and then celebrate together on the great terraces of Os Agostos with a festive buffet and let a few corks fly. This is for members (old and new) only and I ask you to let me know by April 12th, 2019 if and how many of you will attend.R.S.V.P. helga.hampton@btinternet.com PS: For our new members: Maestro Crossley has played for the Amigos on many occasion during our long existence, first at Centro Cultural and later at Os Agostos, and I urge you to visit his website for information about the illustrious career of this great musician. www.paulcrossley/pianist.com

]]>Newsletter, March 2019http://www.amigos-de-musica.org/2019/03/newsletter-march-2019-2/
Mon, 25 Mar 2019 18:35:05 +0000http://www.amigos-de-musica.org/?p=506928 Years of Great Music

To all Amigas/os

From Helga Hampton
NEWSLETTER

March
26, 2019

Dear Amigos,

This
Newsletter will come to you in the form of a “Thank you !” note. I would like to share with you my
gratitude for so many wonderful things that have come our way recently.

First of all
and with great emphasis, let’s thank our main sponsor, the realestate company Quinta
Properties, aka QP (Savills), for their continuing allegiance with the
Amigos. They have over the years
been our major financial supporter and our programming would have been
noticeably constrained were it not for their generosity. Thank you, ladies, and
our best wishes for your next business expansion and the opening of a third
office in the centre of Loule, “Quinta Properties Country”.

The Aparthotel Val Verde in Almancil, whose owners (long-time Amigos) have counted among our sponsors, have to be thanked again for making accommodation for some of our musicians available, free of charge, and even during high season. Thank you very much also in the name of our artists who really appreciate the comfort and luxury of Val Verde.

Thank you to
our Os Agostos hosts who always make
us feel welcome, who spoil us with imaginative catering, who prepare the auditorium
with chairs and either A/C or heating for our comfort and who recently took
such excellent and warm care of Alissa Firsova when she was their guest at OA
during her week of inspiration.
The composition the Amigos commissioned from her is well on the way to
being created – probably to be called “Algarvia” – and will have its world premiere
as part of our June concerts. I`d also like to thank those Amigos who
participated in the entertaining of Alissa and her fiancé, Matthias, in many
different ways.

Thank you to
the Carp Family who allowed us to share in the celebration of their father`s
and Dorris` husband`s life, and the inspiration this also was to our March
musicians.

Jeroen de Groot on violin and Bart van de Roer on piano gave us two
unforgettable music evenings. Both
fully packed houses witnessed such astounding virtuosity as well as refined,
elegant feeling and delicate expression in a most varied programme of music. The
enthusiastic reception by the audience combined with the meaningful atmosphere
of these evenings was generously rewarded with several encores. Jeroen wrote
before returning to Holland: “The Amigos are a great inspiration which gave me
the feeling of total freedom so I could perform with all I have.”

So, my thanks
also go to all of you for being such an attentive and appreciative audience –
have you ever before sat in a concert where there was not a single cough or
sniffles to be heard between movements?

*************

Now lets look
forward to our events still waiting for us during the 2018/19 season:

Our next
musician is Katya Apekisheva, who is
not completely new to the Amigos, having played for us twice already. This beautiful Russian pianist is now
living in the UK but is very busy internationally and is a regular participant
at Piers Lane`s Piano Festival and Competition in Australia. She will come for
our pre-Easter Semana Santa concerts on Tuesday, April 16th and
Thursday, April 18th. Katya will, befittingly, bring us a great
classical programme of works by Schubert, Tchaikovsky, Scriabin and Chopin on
Tuesday, and Prokofiev, Schubert, Haydn, Janacek and Rachmaninov on Thursday.

May 2019: Tuesday, May 14th and Thursday, May 16th, we welcome the German pianist and
cellist, Holger Groschopp and AdeleBitter.

May 21st, 2019 we will be giving a Birthday Party for Maestro
Paul Crossley who asked to celebrate his 75th birthday with the
Amigos! Great honour!

You will be
receiving an Invitation from me within
the next few days with all details.

June
2019: Tuesday, June 11th
and Thursday, June 13th, we conclude the 2018/19 concert season
with performances by Alissa Firsova, piano and Daniel
Rowland, violin.

PLEASE NOTE: Housekeeping Rules –
I am compelled to repeat these more
strongly than ever !!!

1.
Reservations are absolutely necessary,
even for all active members ! Everyone, including
Amigos, who come to OA
without a firm reservation will probably not get a seat, as we are usually
fully booked.

2.
Make your email reservations
as soon as you plan to attend certain concerts. However, PLEASE don’t make them
more than one month in advance – we have noticed that
earlier ones tend to get forgotten and then not cancelled.

3.
Cancellations are also
absolutely necessary as the liberated seats can then be sold to the public.

4. Newest Rule: Please turn your phones off during the concert ! We have had complaints about the bother
of brightly lit screens.

You will receive confirmation, but please cancel as soon
as you know you cannot attend.

____________________________________________________________________

The Amigo Mid-Summer Night Party !! Have you
been waiting to see this announcement in one of my Newsletters?? Well, here it is. We shall end the 2018/19 season with a
party to take place at Os Agostos in cool early evening on Saturday, June 22nd,
2019. Again I reserve giving details for a later date, suffice it to
say: There will be music !!! Our sponsoree, Tiago Rosario, now a piano student at the Music Hoch-Schule in
Munster, Germany, will be giving us
a demonstration of his progress and I can already promise you a good
surprise. This young man is going
places !!!

******

For
any and all questions, or good suggestions you might have, please contact me
anytime via email.

KATYA APEKISHEVA is a renowned Russian born pianist who is in great demand both as a soloist and as a chamber musician. She will give two concerts at Os Agostos during April. The first will be on Tuesday April 16 and Katya will play music by Mozart, Schubert, Tchaikovsky, Scriabin and Chopin. Katya’s second concert will be on Thursday April 18 and the programme will consist of compositions by Prokofiev, Schubert, Haydn, Janacek and Rachmaninov.

***********************

Programme; April, 16th

A.Scriabin 1872 – 1915 2 Impromptus, op 14

F. Schubert 1797 – 1828 6 moments musicaux, D 780

Interval

P. Tchaikovsky 1840 – 93 Seasons, 3 pieces

October, November, December

F. Chopin 1810 – 49 Valse f minor op. 69,

Valse a flat major op.34

Programme; April 18th

S. Prokofiev 1891 – 1953 Visions Fugitives

F. Schubert 1797 – 1828 Four Impromptus op.90

Interval –

J. Haydn 1732 – 1809 Sonata E flat major

Allegro

Adagio
e cantabile

Finale.
Tempo di Minuet

L. Janacek 1854 – 1928 Sonata

The Presentiment. Con Moto

The
Death. Adagio

S. Rachmaninov 1873 – 1943 Etudes-Tableaux op. 39 n. 6 and n.9

Katya was born into a family of musicians in Moscow. She studied at the world-renowned
Gnessin Music School in Moscow for exceptionally gifted children. At the age of
twelve she performed Mozart’s Concerto No.17 with the Gnessin School Orchestra
which was recorded by Moscow Classical Radio.

Katya was a prize winner in the Leeds International and
Scottish Piano Competitions and was once the London Philharmonic “Soloist of
the Year”. As a result she has been recognised as an exceptionally gifted
pianist. Katya continued her studies at the Rubin Music Academy in Jerusalem
where she won an American-Israel Foundation scholarship. Katya then moved to London to study at
the Royal College of Music where she was the recipient of the President’s Rose
Bowl presented to her by HRH the Prince of Wales to whom she has been asked to
perform on several subsequent occasions.

As a recording artist Katya has received widespread
critical acclaim for her interpretations.
Her 2008 recording of Grieg’s solo piano works was selected for a Rising
Star Award in International Piano Magazine. She has collaborated with violinist Jack Liebeck including a
Classical Brit winning CD of works by Dvorak and more recently has produced a
disk of Kreisler arrangements.

Katya has continued a collaboration with the award winning
Belcea Quartet at the Wigmore Hall.
Internationally, Katya made a concerto tour of South Africa performing
with all the major orchestras there.
She has also performed with the Santiago Philharmonic, Wiesbaden
Orchestra, English Chamber Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and Mexico’s
OFUNAM Orchestra. Katya is
Co-Artistic Director of the London Piano Festival.

Katya is a Professor of Piano at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.

Amigos de Música concerts at Os Agostos begin at 7.00pm sharp. Doors open at 6.00pm and wine, fruit juices and canapés will be served. There will also be a short interval with refreshments served. Entry donation is €25 per person for guests and non-members.

The AMIGOS DE MÚSICA is an international group of around 90 members who stage musical activities by internationally renowned musicians and also sponsor young Portuguese musicians. It is a non-profit organization and celebrated its twenty-eighth anniversary last year.

Os Agostos is an impressive XVlll century country estate located above Santa Bárbara de Nexe and near Bordeira. For navigation instructions go to: http://www.osagostos.com and then to “HOW TO GET THERE”. VisibilityPublishStick to the Front PageAuthor4 RevisionsSearch CategoriesForthcoming ConcertsMembers’ PageArchivesNewslettersPast ConcertsPast EventsPressPress ReleasesAdd New TagSeparate with commasWrite an excerpt (optional)Learn more about manual excerpts(opens in a new tab)

Dear Amigos, We started the second part of the 2018/19 concert season with a bang ! Steven Vanhauwaert more than lived up to promises of pyrotechnics, tense expectations of contemporary works and accolades of his monster technique. The full-house audiences on both evenings were rapt listeners to the great tenderness of the Schubert Sonata at the beginning, before Steven, true to his passion, took us to less familiar works. The seldom performed three Saint-Saens mazurkas were presented to us as real bijoux, and then he launched himself into a precipitous Mephisto Waltz. WOW!

Liszt was also to be the focus of the second evening. But before we became privileged to hear his much coveted rendition of Six Transcendental Etudes, Steven taught us about the influence of the two world wars on music by performing and thus making works by Olivier Messiaen and Ferrucio Busoni more than palatable to us. What a great presenter he is! He brought the breathless crowd back to more familiar musical territory by mollifying us with a sweet rendition of the first movement of Schumann`s “Kinderszenen” as encore. I am quite sure that there was hardly a music friend who went home not enrichedWELCOME: The Amigos de Musica membership also was enriched by 4 new members who I would like to welcome here: Cornelia and Philippe Castan from Quinta das Raposeiras joined in January, and Marijke and Matthijs Venker are brand-new amongst us since Tuesday. WELCOME !

March 10 to 16, 2019: Allow me, for chronologys sake, to repeat here from my January Newsletter one of my personal favourite Amigo projects, with a view of exciting your interest, enthusiasm and hopefully your support too. MUSIC PATRONAGE: What began as a personal pursuit of mine, has meanwhile been endorsed by the Amigo Executive Committee, and herewith I would like to invite you to see whether this could be of constructive interest to you, too, as it would benefit from your support in one form or another. Various of our international artists have asked to return after falling in love with the Amigos de Musica, our extraordinary venue and our home, THE ALGARVE. Among them very passionately and repeatedly has been Alissa Firsova. Alissa is one of the young generations most promising and already very successful concert pianists and composers (visit her website). She has offered to compose, for the Amigos (for a fee, of course) an original piece of music that would illuminate the contribution to culture in general and music in particular that our Circle of Music Friends has been making in the Algarve. This piece will have its world premier in June, when Alissa will be our featured artist. We gave her this commission enthusiastically and have successfully found main funding from like-minded music lovers. Alissa will be in Os Agostos for one week between March 10th and 16th to work on this project. If you want to accompany her together with us in this creative process, you can do so by offering totake her out to a coffee or meal and telling her about your Algarve life, or by showing her one of your favourite corners of the Algarve, or by contributing financially to defray some of the inevitable expenses.

While she is here with her fiancé, Matthias, you can always get in touch with her via me. Call me or send me an email and I shall put you in direct touch with the lovely lady. They have a car and are thus mobile. I wish I could inspire you with some of my enthusiasm for this patronage. THANK YOU FOR YOUR PARTICIPATION.

March, Tuesday 19th and Thursday, 21, 2019: Our two March concerts feature the Dutch violinist, Jeroen de Groot and pianist Bart van de Roer, who will first play works by Arvo Paert, Ravel, Sarasate and Franck and then by Beethoven, Isaye, Chopin and Brahms. Full programme is on our website. As a special feature, these concert evenings will be a celebration of the life of a very special Amigo who passed away in 2016. Joop Carp, in his life-time love of music was a very committed member of the Amigos de Musica. He was indeed a real friend on whom I personally was able to depend over all the years. He and his wife, Dorris, actively and generously supported our aims, and I invite you, in the presence of hisdaughters, to join me in giving a special t hought to this lovely man.

CONCERT AGENDA Please note these dates in your agendas – they are fixed. All details will be given later, and will also appear on our website.April 2019: Tuesday, April 16th and Thursday, April 18th, brings back the wonderful pianist Katya Apekisheva May 2019: Tuesday, May 14th and Thursday, May 16th, we welcome the German pianist, Holger Groschopp with the cellist Adele Bitter June 2019: Tuesday, June 11th and Thursday, June 13th, we conclude the 2018/19 concert season with performances by Alissa Firsova, piano and Daniel Rowland, violin.

PLEASE NOTE: In a bit of housekeeping, I am compelled to repeat the following rules:Reservations are absolutely necessary, even for all active members

Make your email reservations as soon as you plan to attend certain concerts. Make them even months in advance if you want, but remember to cancel as soon as you are unable to attend.

Cancellations are also absolutely necessary as the liberated seats can then be sold to the public. During the last concerts we could not accept 7 paying guests because according to our reservation list the house was full. But it transpired that 5 reserved Amigo seats remained empty due no cancellations.

AMIGO EXTRAS “Extras” means Amigos events organised alongside the 18 annual concert performances spread over one membership year, but only for the benefit of members. All events are, of course, music related and social at the same time, i.e. not public, albeit membersfamily and friends are cordially invited to participate. Mark the dates !! Details will be given closer to the individual dates and reservations are necessary.

ASSOCIAÇÃO DE AMIGOS DE MUSICA at Os Agostos

1.A very special Extra Event will be the Celebration of Paul Crossley's 75th Birthday with a Party on Tuesday, May 21st, 2019 at O s Agostos !!!

2. The Amigo Mid-Summer Night Party !! Have you been waiting to see this announcement in one of myNewsletters?? Well, here it is. We shall end the 2018/19 season with a party to take place at Os Agostos in cool early evening on Saturday, June 22nd, 2019. Again I reserve giving details for a later date, suffice it to say: There will be music !!! Our sponsoree, Tiago Rosario, now a piano student at the Music Hoch-Schule in Munster, Germany, will be giving us a demonstration of his progress and I can already promise you a good surprise. This young man is going places !!!

JEROEN de GROOT, VIOLIN & BART van de ROER, PIANO will give two concerts during March 2019. Tuesday March 19 – will feature pieces by Arvo Pärt (composed in his own Tintinnabuli style), Ravel, de Sarasate, and Franck and the second concert – on Thursday March 21 – Jeroen and Bart will play music by Beethoven, Ysaye, Chopin and Brahms.

Amigos de Música concerts at Os Agostos begin at 7.00pm
sharp. Doors open at 6.00pm and wine, fruit juices and canapés will be served.
There will also be a short interval with refreshments served. Entry donation is
€25 per person for guests and non-members.

The AMIGOS DE MÚSICA is an international group of
around 90 members who stage musical activities by internationally renowned
musicians and also sponsor young Portuguese musicians. It is a non-profit
organization and celebrated its twenty-eighth anniversary last year.

Os Agostos is an
impressive XVlll century country estate located above Santa Bárbara de Nexe and
near Bordeira. For navigation instructions go to: http://www.osagostos.com and then to “HOW TO GET THERE”.

February already ! How time flies, and the year has been gaining somespeed after the sluggish post-holiday January.

So let me not only remind you that the Amigos concerts at Os Agostos willrecommence this month, (see below), but give you a few hints about othermusical events planned in and for the Algarve.

On February 9th, 2019 the Orquestra Filamonica Portuguesa will be giving a concert at the Teatro das Figuras with Brahms Third Symphony andTchaikovsky`s First Piano Concerto featuring Raul da Costa. At 21:30. Also on February 9th at the Teatro Lethes the Madrid Baroque Quartet will beplaying Baroque music. They will be at the Igreja do Carmo on Feb. 16th and at the Catedral Se in Faro on Feb. 23, 2019. Amigo Andre Balot pointed these events out to me and suggested to dress warmly – churches at this time of the year tend to be cold.

Thank you, Andre.

Visit the website of the Cineteatro Loule where you will find a varied menu of music starting now: Arabic music, a Festival of Piano Music, etc etc.

And on Tuesday, February 26th and 28th, 2019 the first two Amigo concertswill kick off the second half of our 2018/19 season with the pianist STEVEN VANHAUWAERT at Os Agostos. And the same routine should be followed: Make your reservation by sending an email to reservasconcertos@gmail.com as soon as possible. Just being a member does NOT assure you a seat – please send your reservation(s) in early. If you then find you cannot attend, also send an email to liberate these seats.We usually have full-house audiences, so every seat counts. Thank you.

Here another date you might want to add to your agenda: On March 9th, 2019 the very much lauded performance of Verdi`s opera “La Forca del Destino” from the Royal Opera House Covent Garden will be relayed to our local cinemas. This is with Anna Netrebko and Jonas Kaufmann, and tickets here in London now go for thousands of pounds – if you still can get one.I am still in London, enjoying much music here, so if anyone of you knows of some more musical raisins planned in the near future in the Algarve, pass that news on to me. I shall gladly share it with the Amigos.